First is the Theory of The Other Theory is Wrong. Creationism being the perfect example. But I see the same thing on forums all over the internet; someone who claims to have a new theory of physics, but when pressed for details spends most of his time going on about how Einstein was wrong.

The second is what I call two-for-one theories. There’s the theory on how you can get free energy, or how the universe is only 2 billion years old, or whatever. And then there’s the necessary supporting theory; that all of modern physics, or cosmology, or whatever, is wrong — which usually requires a massive conspiracy dedicated to the continuing falsification of data that would otherwise allow the new theory to triumph.

Chris, thanks for the Peter Lipson article, “Do Physicians Really Believe in Placebos”. While I agree there are ethical issues that need to be considered, I’m not sure I would go as far to say that alternative treatments that make sole use of placebo are out and out unethical. I do agree that many practitioners of alternative medicine overstate the benefits of their particular practice, but many alternative treatments do have some value.

As an outsider to the medical profession, I am confounded why doctors seem to dismiss the power of the patient’s belief as a statistical curiosity — simply something to be controlled for in any study. It would seem to me that the patient’s belief they CAN get better would be the primary concern, indeed at least as important than any medical procedure.

Eric

Perhaps, it used to be done a while ago. But there have been questions of ethics on the practice. I know I’ve seen this discussed on some medical blogs a few months ago. I do not want to post URLs, but check out the ScienceBasedMedicine blog for an article by Peter Lipson titled “Do Physicians Really Believe in Placebos”. It has a link to lots of other blogs discussing a BMJ study on placebos.

Though I just thought of another question: If a placebo effect works, is it bad? If pain is relieved, though no drugs/effective treatment has been administered, couldn’t that be a good thing?

It’s just an interesting thought. I mean, ideally, you’d want to cure the problem, but if there is no cure, and a placebo treatment has a positive effect, with no ill effects, doesn’t this become one of the few times where the phrase “ignorance is bliss” is true?

I’m not saying we should encourage this, and various forms of alt medicine are really trash, but still, it’s something to think about. You guys get my brain fired up.

I totally agree- let’s give them the mission to go out and discover the toughest questions about the universe. Let’s task them with getting sample return missions out to Mars, Jupiter’s moons, Saturn’s moons, and anything else interesting. Fleets and fleets of probes, satellites, and obvservatories working together. They get some science done and I’ll be the first yammering to anybody that will listen that we should triple their funding and then triple it again. And then quadruple it after that for effect.

But if they keep sending people up to that retarded space station though with nothing to do, and sacrificing science because of it, and I’ll also be the guy yammering for them to cut that garbage out and argue they shouldn’t be given another dollar.

Apollo was epic. Nobody is saying the glory days weren’t extraordinary. But manned flight is over. Done. It’s stupid. It’s a waste of money and time and a drain on everything else. Supporting it is like the sketch in Little Britain of the Astronaut that just can’t let go. We need to move on. There is so much NASA could be doing right now and it’s not.

Who knows the name of any astronaut that has been up to the ISS lately? I don’t know a single one, and I read this blog and others like it every day. Who in the public knows about The Hubble and the incredible Mars rovers? Loads do.

Acupuncture is a crock. Ernst & Singh’s ‘Trick or Treatment: Alternative Medicine on Trial’ does a good demolition job.

Back to the bogus science list, I ran across this article http://news.therecord.com/Business/article/476404 on Richard Willis who has invented what appears to be a version of a perpetual motion machine. His unit will, he says, produce more power than it takes in. On a quick reading it seems Park’s Warning Signs 1, 2, 4, 6 and 7 apply.

Good article, but there was thing that really bugged the crap out of me. He said that “data” is not the plural of “anecdote”. Er, actually it is. An anecdote is a singular piece of datum. When you collect several of those together, you get the plural of datum: data!

Now, the point he is trying to get across is that an anecdote is not valid by itself, which is true, but that just doesn’t sound as catch as “data is not the plural of anecdote.” Unfortunately, that’s just plain wrong.

Er, no. You are just plain wrong, here.

Anecdotal evidence is never controlled, never blinded and therefore never reliable to inform scientific progress. Therefore, it matters not how many anecdotes you care to collect, you will never have what a scientist would consider to be data.

Other than the slow going at the beginning of the book (i.e., stop telling me what you’re going to talk about and just TALK ABOUT IT ALREADY!), an interesting read. I recommend it, especially if you want to know about the “positive” results for things like acupuncture.

I see his point as well as yours, but the reason that NASA has done so little (aside from putting over 400 humans in orbit, setting flight endurance records, etc.) is because they have been funding and mission starved since Apollo 17 splashed down.

Giving NASA a real mission and giving it the resources to do the job will almost certainly provide the same benefits.

Privatizing space would benefit only the companies that chose to go there. They would certainly not share what they learned, nor would they freely publish the methods and materials used to accomplish whatever it is that they did. Further, they would have a strong legal case for ownership of the Moon, or Mars, or any asteroid, etc. See the Dutch and British trading cartels from the 18th and 19th century for more information.

You benefit daily from the by-products of Space Race 1.0 and casually disregard them as “warm and fuzzies.” If having a great deal of credit in enabling a technological revolution that resulted in American dominance of the last forty years of the 20th century is so trivial to you, then so be it, but I kindly suggest to you that view is somewhat pedantic.

Rehashing the glory years (and they were glorious) only serves to give us all warm fuzzies. We are stuck in low orbit due to political incompetence and influence and abject fear of taking reasonable risk. Space flight will always be dangerous and the American public is unable to come to terms with astronauts connected to a national space program possibly dying. Maybe the public can take or even ignore a few catastrophes in space if they are part of some corporation or other non-government organization.

I do not deny NASA’s place in history. I watched every televised manned space launch from John Glenn on (the Mercury days). I admire the men and women that put Humanity on the moon. I remember being devastated when Nixon gutted NASA, canceling Apollo. For that, I consider him to be the epitome of evil and worthy of hatred for eternity.

Having manned spaceflight controlled by a government organization is the surest way of killing it off.

On a related note my zero point energy generator is almost ready to be revealed to a (soon to be) grateful world. I just need a small amount of funding to finish some last tests…….;-)

@Peiter: Theonion did a great article once announcing that the FDA had finally approved ‘Placebo’ for use in medicines. Seriously funny.

“BTW, if you like Park’s list, go and have a look at John Baez’ crackpot index. Click on my name to visit the site.”

I woz just about to link to that!

Types the man on a computer whose provenance goes through the Apollo program.

Let NASA do the robotic stuff (and keep Dr. Park happy).

A structured study provides data suitable for decision making. A collection of stories (anecdotes) does not. All a collection of anecdotes provides is a possible area of investigation, NOT evidence of efficacy.

I think I agree with about 99.9% of what Bob Park writes about. Smart fella.

“Assuming we’re all on board with Bob Park’s rule #2, you’ll agree that had acupuncture worked properly (i.e., not merey as a placebo), it would be part of modern medicine by now. The same is true for all the old alternative medicine.”

I’ve always been a little uneasy about this type of statement, regardless of who makes it. It may generally be true but it’s still an assumption. There is still the reality of wether it has been studied and if so in what depth.

It was recently shown that honey does have a positive affect on coughs even though it’s been touted as such as a home remedy before:

http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/honey/AN01799
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=17618590
http://www.webmd.com/cold-and-flu/9-tips-to-treat-colds-and-flu-the-natural-way

Note: don’t give honey to kids younger than 2 years old because of the risk of botulism.

Granted something like acupuncture is a different beast than a single remedy like honey.

Now, the point he is trying to get across is that an anecdote is not valid by itself, which is true, but that just doesn’t sound as catch as “data is not the plural of anecdote.” Unfortunately, that’s just plain wrong.